MEET DR. LAUREN

Many of you know me as I have been treating horses especially in California for many years. But I want to give you all a little background. I give many talks and now since technology has given us so many opportunities, power point talks, I am always asked how I came to start doing this type of work.  There was one defining moment which started this process. I will get to this. My animals have always been my guides.

ZERO AND LAUREN

I had always, even as a child had an interest in alternative medicine. My mother leaned very much in that direction. I had personal health problems which responded to the work of our family Osteopath rather than the standard MD. I started to go my own direction in school when I took a serious fall from a school horse and was told after radiographs that I needed immediate surgery and if I refused, the only other thing that would keep me out of a wheel chair for the rest of my life was 6 weeks in traction at the very least and limited activity forever.  I had just been accepted into Veterinary school and also had secured the first paid job on the Davis Campus Dairy that a woman had EVER been offered. There was NO WAY that I was going to follow their advice.

I went to our “Science of Mind” minister and asked him if he had any suggestions. I was in almost unbearable pain at the time and it was constant.  He sent me to an old school chiropractor/healer and in ONE TREATMENT, THE PAIN WAS 80% GONE. I bucked hay, chased cows and did all the things that girls aren’t supposed to do all summer, went back home every week for a treatment. By the time school started up, I was fully functional. I never took any medication during this ordeal. I also had refused to look at my radiographs because that was not the reality that I would accept for the rest of my life. I am not telling you to follow my example, but I still feel the same way about medical problems, and I am still going strong and have NO BACK ISSUES.  I still will not look at any x-rays.

I started my veterinary career treating dogs and cats because there were almost no jobs for women at that time in the equine world. I had had an obsession with horses since a small child. My parents had no clue as to why this was because they were city folks. But you ladies know what I mean. Once you are infected with the “horse bug” it never goes away.

In veterinary school I teamed up with four other people and we bought a horse which I finally ended up with. This horse was my school psychiatrist. If I had not had him (we named him Zero) I could not have survived the mental stress of vet school.  We bought him out of a field of unknown horses from a horse trader who knew nothing about any of them, and did we ever "luck out." This horse was bomb-proof, had done everything and would do anything and keep you safe.

I became increasingly dis-enchanted with conventional approaches to medicine, and finally stopped doing it and went to work the Humane Society for the next 5 years. This gave me a lot of riding time and I took up NATRC and Endurance riding.

                                                     CENTER AND LAUREN AT ENDURANCE RIDE

I had several horses at that time, but after trying my hand at training, I thought I was pretty good and wanted to train a Mustang. I was first introduced to my now 32 year-old best friend, Center, who became MY teacher, not the opposite. He was two at the time and one of the best days of my life was my introduction to this guy. He had not been harmed or abused, had a two foot mane that in the worst tangle possible, but he was a very special animal. He took life’s traumas and my mistakes in stride so much so that I named him CENTER, because he always found his quickly no matter what.

CENTER'S MEMORIAL CLIFF

During one of our conditioning rides after a heavy rain, the trail we were on had been damaged by motorcycle riders and literally fell out from under us. I thought we were going to die. In slow motion we turned upside down and dropped about 12 feet onto rocks. I landed on my nose, hands and legs and I thought Center was going to land on top of me. As it was, he landed beside me on his feet (how, I do not know). In his usual way he said to me, “That was interesting, Mom. Now what do you want to do?”

Miraculously, we were not seriously hurt. This was above a rock quarry which was guarded by two vicious dogs that would always leap at us as we passed through. Miraculously, the dogs were not out that day. Talk about angels anyone?

This happened I guess to teach me about “crookedness.” Center had had a little unevenness in his stride previous to our fall; now it was unmistakable. It wasn’t unevenness now, it was "CROOKED." I had no clue, nor did any of my colleagues. I even took him to a human chiropractor who was trying to work on horses. Nothing improved the situation. He wasn’t lame, but we would ride out for a 20 mile conditioning ride and I would walk him ten miles home time after time. But nothing would show up on the standard tests.

Finally I found a short course in Veterinary Acupuncture and went for a “weekend wonder” course. IT CHANGED MY LIFE. The equine teacher had airline problems and couldn’t even show up; so I had a very little bit of knowledge, some charts, some canine acupuncture suggestions and a few needles. I started playing around and FIXED MY HORSE. Then I started working on my friends’ animals and had such outstanding results I knew this was my next direction. I had to really learn how to do this. So I immersed myself in the study and received my Veterinary Acupuncture Certificate in 1989 from IVAS,(International Veterinary Acupuncture Society.)

As I learned to treat animals with acupuncture, I began to realize that this was only half the solution.  I knew I had to learn to do some type of body manipulation as well. I had already gone beyond traditional Chiropractic for myself, and did not want to do the “cracker” sorts of adjustments that had not worked for my own body. I  had learned enough about acupuncture and Directional Non-Force Chiropractic for people that I knew this was my direction. I worked with a great practitioner who helped me translate his gentle adjustments to horses and for several years we gave seminars together.

I started back into private practice in 1990, and determined that I was going to limit my practice to the Alternatives and become as good as possible from that direction. That is what I have done for the last 20 plus years, and it has been very helpful to my patients.

My studies continued in my search for the answers to equine problems. I worked with Dr. Deb Bennett in dissection classes and clinics. I continued to ride and study dressage and how that could help my patients. I found the most successful veterinary acupuncture person I could and interned with him. He wasn’t thrilled with women, or me, but as a fellow veterinarian, he was obligated to teach me his secrets. The most important thing I learned in following him around at every opportunity was that horses kept repeating the SAME PATTERNS OF PAIN OVER AND OVER AGAIN. He did not know why, but he knew how to improve these horses.  I needed to know why this happens, and the answer started to come to me at a Deb Bennett clinic.

To teach people about crookedness, and the damaging effects of horses that LEAN, Dr. Deb has people crawl around on all fours. Then they are asked to arch up like a cat, and hollow out, and arch up again. Then lean like a horse does and repeat the exercise. While following her instructions I developed the EXACT SAME PATTERN that had been driving me nuts in the horses. It is a cascade which ends up CRAMPING the ILIOPSOAS MUSCLE and goes on to lock up the pelvis and affect the Sciatic nerve.

When I put this together with my studies of anatomy, my success improved 100 fold. I used these Indirect manipulations specifically on the Iliopsoas muscle and formed a paradigm of how it all happens and ends up as what I call the SACRO-SCIATIC SYNDROME. I know the Psoas is the most important component, and It is my opinion that as well as affecting the other muscles of the hind quarters, this causes stress to the SACRO-SCIATIC LIGAMENT which is underneath all these muscles. This ligament  inserts on the Ischium (or “sits bones”). This area is always extremely painful in horses with this problem. Incidentally the Sciatic nerve comes right through this ligament.

Having experienced Sciatic pain myself, horses act like I used to feel when they have this condition. And I find that it is THE MOST COMMON PROBLEM RIDDEN HORSES HAVE. The nice thing is, it underlies so many other problems that develop from compensation, and it is not that hard to fix, especially with a gentle manipulation and LIFEWAVE PATCHES. I am going to teach as many people as possible how to do this.